Guardian files suit over DCFS foster rule

Kids stay in homes even while agency considers removal

November 15, 2001|By Robert Becker, Tribune staff reporter.

A critic of a controversial rule that governs when the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services can remove a child from a foster home has taken the matter to court, hoping a judge will succeed where DCFS and the state legislature have failed.

Cook County Guardian Patrick Murphy filed a lawsuit Wednesday in Cook County Circuit Court on behalf of two minors against DCFS chief Jess McDonald, seeking to end a DCFS policy mandating that children remain in their foster home while their foster parents appeal the agency's decision to remove them.

DCFS' current policy says children can only be moved from their foster homes when their safety is at imminent risk. Murphy argues that DCFS should act when it is in the best interest of the child--and not wait until they are physically imperiled.

Murphy's lawsuit contends the DCFS policy has a chilling effect on caseworkers, who "do not even try to remove children from inadequate foster homes because they fear they cannot meet the imminent risk standard."

Murphy and McDonald agree the policy needs to be changed, but they say the legislative committee that oversees such rule modifications--the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules--has blocked attempts to do so.

"We were prevented from implementing a rule that would address Patrick's concerns--and they were ours too," said Martha Allen, chief of staff to DCFS' McDonald.

State Sen. Barack Obama, who co-chairs the rules committee, said late Wednesday he recalled the debate over the proposed rule change but was uncertain whether his committee had unequivocally prohibited the modification.

"There were a number of advocacy groups that objected to the rules based on the concern that foster parents possess some due process rights," Obama said.

Murphy, whose office serves as the attorney for children who are abused or neglected, is adamant that the rule must be changed.

"They leave kids in foster homes that never should have kids, and they're backing up the system," said Murphy. "There is more abuse and neglect in foster homes today than there has been in the last 32 years. . . . It's an epidemic."

Murphy's lawsuit describes the plight of two children in foster care.

In one instance, 2-year-old Kimberly's foster mother permits the child's father, who has sexually abused other family members, to have contact with Kimberly. The foster parent has refused to allow visits by the social agency charged with monitoring Kimberly's well-being.

In a second case, 9-year-old Bianca's foster parent has refused to provide the child with the medications she needs.

In both cases, DCFS has said it wants to relocate the children and the foster parent has appealed. The children remain with the foster parents pending the outcome of those appeals, the suit asserts.